Hardball Host … Likes A Softball
At least until Fox comes up. Boston Herald’s Jessica Heslam interviewed Chris Matthews, reports he was picky about what questions he would take:
A petulant Chris Matthews wouldn’t talk about MSNBC’s recent ratings dip during an interview flogging his fawning essay on the late Sen. Edward Kennedy that’s in the November issue of Boston magazine.
“Let’s just drop all the conversation about my network,” the “Hardball” host huffed the other day. “I’m not a media critic.”
It could be that Matthews got a little hot under the collar because his left-leaning network has been losing viewers.
Nicely put, Jess. I swear I didn’t edit that.
During the recent third-quarter ratings period, Fox News averaged about 2.26 million total viewers in prime time and was up 2 percent from the same time last year. CNN had 949,000 viewers and was down 30 percent. MSNBC averaged 795,000 viewers and was down 10 percent.
In the coveted 25- to 54-year-old demographic, Fox News averaged 589,000 viewers and was up 5 percent. CNN had 288,000 and was down 39 percent. SNBC had 275,000 and was down 21 percent.
Mediaweek television analyst Marc Berman says Fox News is well above the competition.
“There’s bleeding everywhere except Fox News,” Berman said. “The rich has gotten richer and that’s Fox News.”
Say “Thank you, Mr. President,” Fox News.
Hold up, turns out Matthews is a media critic after all.
Matthews did, however, weigh in on the feud between rival Fox News and the Obama administration, which has accused the channel of being an “arm of the Republican Party” and said it shouldn’t be treated as a news organization.
“My hunch is they’ve discovered in their research that the commentators on that network have begun to cut into the independents and that they’re worried that some independents are listening to those voices and believing them,” Matthews opined.
Being a media commentator didn’t hurt so much, did it? That’s not a bad point. Now, does that means those independents are not listening to MSNBC’s voices, or at least not believing them? Dunno …
Here’s the latest on Fox, btw.
HotAir: Barred from interviewing pay czar. Other networks deserve praise for standing up, forcing the O admin to back down. They may be keenly aware that a precedent wouldn’t serve them, HotAir suggests. Also, HotAir with more from the Whiner-in-Chief.
Riehl: How long before this guy goes full Chavez?
Director Blue: ACLU protest, please. Actually, I’d like to hear from the DNC. And anyone else who ever accused the Bush administration of behaving in a high-handed manner with the media, the public, the political process and constitutional rights.
Might help if, as Moe Lane notes, someone besides Fox News and a bunch of bloggers was reporting on it.
Meanwhile, waiting for Steve Benen at Washington Monthly to update his O Admin apologia, objecting to an NPR editor’s description of O’s Fox feud as Nixonian:
I’d like to think Ken Rudin knows better. I expected too much.
Now would be an excellent time for a reality break. Has the Obama White House ordered the Justice Department to spy on Fox News employees? Has the administration ordered the IRS to start digging through Fox News’ books, hunting for irregularities and auditing on-air personalities? Has the president directed thugs to break into Glenn Beck’s psychiatrist’s office?
Of course not, that would be insane.
Yes, it would be. And icing them out of pool events while the president and his aides whine about them is a good start. For some reason Rudin apologized for the Nixonian remark, which Benen salutes, though he doesn’t seem to have noticed the day’s O Chavezness.
Ha! Washington Examiner: WH drops the Fox thing, goes after Cheney. Reynolds: “Yeah, this’ll end well …”
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 11:10 pm on Thursday, October 22, 2009
10 Responses to “Hardball Host … Likes A Softball”
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October 22nd, 2009 at 11:11 pm
Even Anderson Cooper, the lifetime bachelor who introduced the gay term “tea-bagger” into the political discourse, had a mildly critical piece about the Obama war on Fox. As for Matthews, wouldn’t you avoid talking about ratings if you were in his shoes?
October 23rd, 2009 at 1:20 am
One thing you now know is that saying “Obama=Nixon” is beyond the pale. It’s much worse than “Obama=Hitler” or anything else you could come up with. So from now on, one should look for Obama/Nixon analogies just like people used to come up with Bush/Hitler analogies. Just off the top of my head:
Obama was showing his Nixonian side before the current dust up over Fox News. I liked the way he got Oprah to slip “Obama’s the One” in under the radar—”Nixon’s the One” is the all-time-number-one election slogan (followed by “In Your Heart You Know He’s Right”). Obama couldn’t directly plagiarize for obvious reasons, but somehow he foresaw that the public would accept it if “Obama’s the One” was uttered with a blissed-out wide-eyed stare, instead of Nixon’s beady-eyed glare. Obama even introduces his lies and half truths with the Nixonian “let me be (perfectly) clear.”
Then there’s the way he used the war as a lever. At the time, I thought we were close to getting Iran where we wanted them, but then Obama made it clear that they’d get a much better deal out of him than from Bush, thus prolonging the war. He’s even got Kissinger on some kind of retainer, working the back channels or whatever.
October 23rd, 2009 at 5:17 am
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October 23rd, 2009 at 7:06 am
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October 23rd, 2009 at 3:18 pm
When you look at this administration’s performance to date, it’s like the Democratic Party went out and found themselves a caricature of everything that they complained about/hated/feared with regard to George W Bush… only this time? It’s all true.
- Moe Lane
That bears repeating as often as possible.
October 23rd, 2009 at 6:12 pm
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October 24th, 2009 at 12:12 am
[...] MATTHEWS NO MEDIA CRITIC: Hardball Host … Likes A Softball. At least until Fox comes up. Boston Herald’s Jessica Heslam interviewed Chris Matthews, reports [...]
October 24th, 2009 at 3:13 am
Pfff. Chris Matthews became the court fool for the PrObama movement ever since he got that famous “thrill” up his leg.
Watch him stumblebum his attack against Stewart Rhodes of The Oath Keepers: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bs7NrjaNrc
Jeebus! But does know the ‘Progressive’ narrative…I’ll give him that.
The man does read his marching orders/memos and executes them to the best of his abilities.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:15 pm
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November 3rd, 2009 at 5:30 pm
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